Black spots on cleaner shrimp

[Zachary Hart]

Hi, I recently noticed little black spots appearing on my cleaner shrimp,which I have now had for a few months. They range in size from the head of a pin to a few millimetres in diameter. I am curious to find out what they are and the implications they can have on the shrimp thanks. I will attach a photo so you can see more clearly the issue

[Clown79]

It sometimes indicates an issue with water quality, injury, iodine issues, disease.

 

 

It sometimes goes away with the next few molts.

[Zachary Hart]

I'd say he has moltes 2 times since this discussion and the dots have only become worse. He now has many more on his torso. Appetite does not seem to be affected and he does not seem to be bothered by them. Does this mean that it's not serious.  Thanks

 

I meant molted once. Not twice

[mcarroll]

5 hours ago, Zachary Hart said:

Does this mean that it's not serious.

Sounds like nothing more than a color differentiation.  I'd stop worrying as long as the system overall is good and healthy.

 

Any reason you can think of for a health issue to be happening?   (They're never really random...it takes stress.)

[Aurortpa]

6 hours ago, Zachary Hart said:

I'd say he has moltes 2 times since this discussion and the dots have only become worse. He now has many more on his torso. Appetite does not seem to be affected and he does not seem to be bothered by them. Does this mean that it's not serious.  Thanks

 

I meant molted once. Not twice

I have encountered this before—apparently it’s called black spot disease and like Clown said it may or may not resolve itself with future molts. Check your SPG, it is rumored low SPG can allow it to proliferate.

 

As far as I know it isn’t really treatable except maybe with raising SPG, moreover anything else it isn’t dangerous.  

 

 

[Zachary Hart]

By SPG do you mean specific gravity. Mine stays at 1.025 relatively constant. As far as health issues are concerned I can't think of anything. Water quality tests well, apart from a slightly higher nitrate level, hopefully caused by my sponge filter which i am replacing with my own that I'm making. 

[mcarroll]

On 12/27/2018 at 5:38 AM, Zachary Hart said:

I recently noticed little black spots appearing on my cleaner shrim

 

On 12/27/2018 at 5:38 AM, Zachary Hart said:

 

On 12/27/2018 at 10:41 AM, Clown79 said:

It sometimes indicates an issue with water quality, injury, iodine issues, disease.

 

After reading a little, these shrimps seem to be susceptible to "white spot" and isopods, but I'm not seeing anything about black spots.

 

Anyone have a link with more info about this parasite or whatever it's supposed to be?

 

Here's where I'm looking..maybe suggest a different search?

https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C47&q=lysmata+pathogen+|+parasite&btnG=

[mcarroll]

(removing the "pathogen | parasite" terms gave me (surprisingly given the search engine) a reefs.org link to a Bob Fenner article that mentions something called "turbellarian "black spot" disease" (in relation to tangs) which sounds like (from putting that back into Google Scholar) it might be it.  Affects crabs that are older or under stress that do not molt as fast, or crabs that hang out in substrates high in bacteria with chitinase activity.

 

Anyone think this is what we're looking at here?  There's no mention of Lysmata shrimps in the literature, but that may just be a lack of searching.

 

Current search:  https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C47&q=turbellarian+"black+spot"+disease&btnG=

[Clown79]

Nope, don't have a link saved and the last time I did the research it took a long time to find the info

[Aurortpa]

Here was Bob’s response to what seems your shrimp friend has—he suspected algae.